NYFF Report: Steve Carell and Channing Tatum Descend into Darkness for 'Foxcatcher'

Channing Tatum and Steve Carell in ‘Foxcatcher’

If you only know Steve Carell as the world’s funniest 40-year-old virgin, prepare to have your image of him radically transformed. In Bennett Miller’s Foxcatcher, the actor literally disappears into the dark, dramatic role of John du Pont. Through the magic of makeup, Carell’s features have been altered to play the scion of one of America’s wealthiest families, who was convicted of murdering Olympic wrestler Dave Schultz in 1997. An avid, but amateur, wrestling fan, du Pont had hired Dave and his brother Mark (played by Mark Ruffalo and Channing Tatum respectively) to oversee Team Foxcatcher, the crew he hoped to lead to multiple gold medals. But du Pont’s own eccentricities took their toll on his relationship with the Schultz brothers with ultimately tragic results. It’s a vanishing act of a performance that has made Carell an Oscar contender since Foxcatcher's premiere at Cannes back in May. That buzz will likely only grow louder following the movie's New York Film Festival debut on Friday. Carell, Tatum, Ruffalo, costars Vanessa Redgrave, Anthony Michael Hall, Sienna Miller, and director Miller were on hand for a press conference after the screening.

"The makeup designer, Bill Corso, and I spent several months doing camera tests to try and figure out what the right version of the look would be," Carell said. "Du Pont had a very specific look to him, and I can’t help but think that it had an effect on the people around him and made them react to him in a specific way." Corso and Carell were so successful that moviegoers aren’t the only people who’ll have trouble recognizing the actor; even the cast and crew saw no hint of the former star of The Office. “When I arrived on set [in makeup], people treated me differently,” said Carell. “It separated me from the rest of the cast. It’s only now during the press tours that I’ve gotten to know these guys!”

Besides the makeup, Carell also found inspiration in rare outtakes from a documentary about du Pont commissioned by the man himself. (Du Pont died in prison in 2010.) “One of the most interesting aspects of that documentary was the raw footage, the parts of himself he didn’t want to be seen publicly,” said Carell. “That gave me more insight than anything into the type of person he was, the way he instructed the crew and the way he went through his lines, establishing an identity for the camera. I think he was a very tortured individual.” And while the du Pont family understandably didn’t provide the film with much in the way assistance, Carell said that he had a random encounter with someone claiming to be a relative. “I ran into someone who introduced themselves as a du Pont in a Target store in North Hollywood. I was buying a fake plant or something, and he introduced himself and was very pleasant and curious [about the film], but not confrontational in any way.”

Unlike Carell or Ruffalo, Tatum was able to spend some time with the person he portrays in Foxcatcher — the real Mark Schultz came onboard the film as an associate producer. (He also has a small cameo.) “We all went to dinner one night before shooting and we were walking around the streets of New York afterwards,” the Magic Mike star remembered. “Mark [Ruffalo] and I started hanging back and he said, ‘Look at the way Mark [Schultz] walks. It’s such a beautiful indication of how he goes through the world. So I started studying his movements and I found that to be a way into the role for me.”

Tatum and Mark Ruffalo

Foxcatcher is Miller’s third film and also his third based on a real-life story, after Capote and Moneyball. The filmmaker, who won the Best Director prize in Cannes, admitted that while it’s coincidental, it’s not entirely accidental. “I like examining real events, which have become the purview of different kinds of storytelling, like infotainment, that personally leave me unsatisfied and wanting,” he said. “They have this lightning-fast impulse to look at a story and conclude, ‘This is this,’ then turn it in for consumption and find the next thing that gives you that fix. Living in a world with so much noise and so many stories, I have a tendency to want to sit down and grab things, to pour a ton of care into something that is otherwise receding into the recesses of memory, which is inconsiderate of the lives involved. Foxcatcher itself is the tip of the iceberg.” Audiences will be able to see for themselves soon enough when the movie hits theaters on Nov. 14.

Watch a trailer for Foxcatcher:

Photo credit: AP Photo/Sony Pictures Classics, Scott Garfield